The Perfect Attack

[Guest]

I once paid one of the best vocal coaches in my country for a lesson, keep in mind this was ridiculously expensive and I could not keep this up. As soon as he heard my voice (which was worn out from overtraining) he said I should stop singing and stop talking for the next week. He had me work on a relaxed grudge sound (vocal fry) which I can only do occasionally since my voice is naturally pure of tone. After hearing that I was "forcing" the vocal fry sound he took a break from that and simply had me do a surprise "oh." He told me that I could be working on these simple exercises for MONTHS.

What I have come to realize is...

When a violinist plays his instrument what is the most important part of the technique? When the bow makes contact with the string! Similarly when air makes contact with the vocal folds is when the sound is being produced. The "point" of attack is what actually makes a majority of the sound. I realized this when I was practicing headtones.. I simple did some "ah ah ahs" in the lower register and "ouu ouu ouus" in the upper register. Guess what? Next thing you know my voice was staying connected and the tone itself was much stronger. Another point I'd like to mention is after a few ridiculously relaxed "ah ah ahs" my voice produced the "grudge" sound automatically! When trying to say "hah" all of a sudden the crackly sound came out!

What this vocal coach was trying to help me understand (ofcourse he did not explain anything in depth, vocal coaches like keeping their secrets lol)... the "point" of attack is something most people underestimate. When he had me doing the "oh" exercise it was as if the vocal fold were gently coming together almost as if I was surprised.

Now my problem is I'm actually ATTACKING the glottis and hurting myself to produce sound, and I can rarely make the vocal fry sound. Also I am working with over 3 octaves so every note requires a different amount of sensitivity. How should I breath in order to sustain the quality of the onset on every note? What exercises will help me find my perfect attack? I would rather just not sing then keep slamming my vocal cords together :/

Help!!

- JayMC

[Danielformica]

The perfect attack is a silent h. closer to ah than ha. If you are squeezing I would do ha for a couple weeks then back to a silent h ah.

[ronws]

I like what Lunte said. Onsets are singing, singing is onsets. That's the catch-phrase. Then he gets neck-deep (pun intended) into working your onsets.